4th Gen Xeon Scalable series to launch January 10th
Intel confirmed the release date of its new data-center products.
After countless delays, Intel Sapphire Rapids series finally have a release date. The new data-center CPU series based on Intel 7 process technology is set to arrive on January 10th, the company confirmed yesterday.
Intel is ready to introduce products that have ‘met product release qualifications’, according to the official information. This likely means that not all known Sapphire Rapids SKUs will be introduced at the same time, but this is still better than not launching any product at all. Sapphire Rapids has seen as many as 12 different steppings through its development, and the release date has been pushed back many times.
. @intelnews made it official today: “4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processor (Sapphire Rapids, editors note) SKUs have met product release qualifications and the company is starting to ramp-up deployment, Intel (…) will be hosting a launch event on Jan. 10.” – 2023 of course!
— Andreas Schilling 🇺🇦 (@aschilling) November 1, 2022
According to TrendForce reasearch, Intel faces Sapphire Rapids production delays due to poor yields of the Intel 7 process. This is the same 10nm node that is used by Alder Lake and Raptor Lake. Such a report is contrary to Intel calling this node ‘healthy’ a few months ago, hence this quote should be taken with a grain of salt.
According to the latest TrendForce research, the mass production schedule of new Sapphire Rapids products has been delayed due to the poor yield rate of the Intel 7 process. At present, the production yield rate of Sapphire Rapids is estimated at only 50~60%, which affects mainstream Sapphire Rapids MCC products.
— TrendForce, Mark Liu
Intel Sapphire Rapids is designed for “Eagle Stream” platform that will support PCIe Gen5 and DDR5 technologies. It will also be compatible with the successor called “Emerald Rapids”, which is set to launch in the same year. The new data-center CPU series will offer up to 56 cores based on “Golden Cove” architecture, which are all big aka ‘Performance’ cores.
| Intel Xeon Series Roadmap | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| VideoCardz | Sapphire Rapids | Emeralds Rapids | Granite Rapids | Diamond Rapids |
| Series | 4th Gen Xeon | 5th Gen Xeon | 6th Gen Xeon | 7th Gen Xeon |
| Socket | Socket E | Socket E | TBC | TBC |
| Release Year | 2023 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025+ |
| Platform | Eagle Stream | Eagle Stream | Birch Stream | TBC |
| Core µArch | Golden Cove | Redwood Cove | Next Performance-Core | Next Performance-Core |
| Fabrication Node | Intel 7 | Intel 7 | Intel 3 | TBC |
| Max Cores | 56 | ~64 | TBC | TBC |
| Max TDP | 350W | ~370W | TBC | TBC |
| Max L3 Cache | 112MB | 120MB | TBC | TBC |
| Memory Support | 8x DDR5-4800 | 8x DDR5-5600 | 8x DDR5 | 8x DDR5 |
| HBM Support | up to 64GB HBM2e | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| PCI Express | PCIe 5/4, 80 lanes | PCIe 5.0, 80 lanes | PCIe 5.0 | PCIe 6.0 |
| CXL Support | Gen1 | Gen1 | Gen2 | Gen3 |
Source: Andreas Schilling (HardwareLuxx), TrendForce